Upcoming classes and events: "Living More Magically", Sun, November 6, 2-5pm, on-line or in person in Catonsville. Friday Nov 24, 4-5pm, "Black Friday" meditation, Revolve Wellness Studios in Catonsville. Contact me to register or for more information.
Anyone who’s made a New Year’s resolution knows, it’s one thing to make a change in your life; it’s another to make it stick. Our consciousness is thermoplastic: once it is “warmed up” by raising energy, it can be reshaped by the ritual. But then we have to return to the everyday world. (Sorry, but that’s how it is. You can’t stay on the mountaintop, the air is too thin and there’s no food.)
We have to let the mind cool in its new shape, let it firm up a bit, before being placed back into its regular use. Otherwise it will go back to it’s old shape as soon as it’s in its old environment.
So just like a novel, film, or play doesn’t cut off after the climactic moment — Luke blows up the Death Star and the film ends — an effective ritual must allow for a gentle resolution back to practical, “ordinary” consciousness. You need some cool down.
But since our goal is to emerge from the ritual changed, its a good idea for the resolution to guide us in a new direction, remind us of what has changed.
In the Neopagan world we often end group rituals by closing and dismantling the circle and saying “Merry meet, merry part, and merry meet again” – an excellent suggestion for an attitude to hold until next time.
Another stock phrase is “So mote it be”, probably coming from Freemasonry and meaning “So May It Be” or “So Must It Be”.
All these things let you know “okay, we’ve taken your brain out of the furnace now, we’re letting it cool.”
In group workings there’s often some social time afterwards (”wine and cakes”, in some Wiccan traditions) that lets us gradually move back to ordinary reality.
It’s a simple thing, but an important step.
